Should the Church go green?
March 17th 2008 22:35
In what the media dubbed as the new seven deadly sins, senior Vatican official Msgr. Gianfranco Girotti said one of the modern sins was pollution. It reflects the new concern that the Pope has had towards environmental concerns. Recent attempts to help save the planet include installing 1000 solar panels in the Paul VI Audience Hall, joining a reforestation program to offset carbon emissions and handing out prayer books made from recycled paper at a youth festival.
The Catholic Church is not alone in its attention to taking care of God’s planet. At the Southern Baptist Convention, plans were announced to fight global warming. The California diocese of the Episcopal Church has appointed a canon for environmental ministry. Plus many Christian organisations, churches and ministries are working in small ways to tackle the environmental problem. Project Green Church and Ecofaith are two Australian organisations that combine Christian faith with environmental concern.
So should Christians care about the environment? Is climate change something we should worry about? How much effort should we spend on saving endangered wildlife? Should the protection of natural areas be important to us?
One friend of mine made the comment that we shouldn’t do anything to help save animals because it was far more important to save people. Another said that he didn’t believe in climate change because apparently there is a verse in the bible that says we shouldn’t worry about it. (I did ask him where it was, but he couldn’t remember.)
I disagree with my friends. I care deeply for the environment, partly because I think it is important in its own right, but partly because I believe that my Christian faith compels me to care about the world we live in.
As a Christian, I believe that God created the world. Every plant, animal and mineral was designed by him. And boy, did he do a good job. He could have just created a desert and let us survive on rainwater and manna. But no. He created beauty and diversity, along with functionality. Even the bottom of the seas, where man would not venture for billions of years, were filled with the most wondrous creatures.
So why did he do it? Why not just create the bare basics? After all, if all we are meant to care about is people, wouldn’t that be the more sensible thing to do? Why distract us with all that other stuff?
When we look at the creation account in Genesis, God seems to have created the world partly for his own pleasure. He made the land and seas, the plants and animals, then man and said that it was good. Although man is told he may rule over every living thing, I believe this is more as a stewardship role, rather than a use and abuse role. As Christian, I think we should take this stewardship role seriously.
But I also think that the earth, with all its richness, beauty and diversity, is a gift from God. God didn’t just give us the bare necessities to enable us to live. I believe that the reason he didn’t was because he didn’t want us just to have the bare necessities. He wanted us to have the smell of flowers, the beauty of sunsets, the taste of strawberries, the wonders of whale watching, the feeling of sand between the toes and all the other marvels that the natural world has to offer. Not because we need it – because we don’t – but because he wanted to bless us. He wanted us to have this gift. When we destroy our environment, when we cause the animals and plants that he created to become extinct, to some extent we are throwing God’s gift back in his face.
Once while walking, my son asked me how I could tell that God was real. I pointed to a tree and said that tells me. It helps us breathe. It provides a home for the birds. It provides food for the animals. It has a complex structure that allows it to do all this, stay alive and reproduce. It does so much and is still so beautiful. Whenever I see a tree, I see God.
I see God in so many different ways in nature. I see echoes of his voice in the singing of birds. I see his reflection in the clouds. I catch a whiff of his aroma in the first flowers of Spring.
I don’t see him in shopping malls or polluted rivers or littered parks or destroyed bushland. And that’s my final reason for wanting to protect the environment. I want to be able to see God. Maybe not the real face-to-face encounter with God, but the shadow of him that he’s given us with the gift of this remarkable planet. And generations from now, I want my descendants to be able to see that God too.
The Catholic Church is not alone in its attention to taking care of God’s planet. At the Southern Baptist Convention, plans were announced to fight global warming. The California diocese of the Episcopal Church has appointed a canon for environmental ministry. Plus many Christian organisations, churches and ministries are working in small ways to tackle the environmental problem. Project Green Church and Ecofaith are two Australian organisations that combine Christian faith with environmental concern.
So should Christians care about the environment? Is climate change something we should worry about? How much effort should we spend on saving endangered wildlife? Should the protection of natural areas be important to us?
One friend of mine made the comment that we shouldn’t do anything to help save animals because it was far more important to save people. Another said that he didn’t believe in climate change because apparently there is a verse in the bible that says we shouldn’t worry about it. (I did ask him where it was, but he couldn’t remember.)
I disagree with my friends. I care deeply for the environment, partly because I think it is important in its own right, but partly because I believe that my Christian faith compels me to care about the world we live in.
As a Christian, I believe that God created the world. Every plant, animal and mineral was designed by him. And boy, did he do a good job. He could have just created a desert and let us survive on rainwater and manna. But no. He created beauty and diversity, along with functionality. Even the bottom of the seas, where man would not venture for billions of years, were filled with the most wondrous creatures.
So why did he do it? Why not just create the bare basics? After all, if all we are meant to care about is people, wouldn’t that be the more sensible thing to do? Why distract us with all that other stuff?
When we look at the creation account in Genesis, God seems to have created the world partly for his own pleasure. He made the land and seas, the plants and animals, then man and said that it was good. Although man is told he may rule over every living thing, I believe this is more as a stewardship role, rather than a use and abuse role. As Christian, I think we should take this stewardship role seriously.
But I also think that the earth, with all its richness, beauty and diversity, is a gift from God. God didn’t just give us the bare necessities to enable us to live. I believe that the reason he didn’t was because he didn’t want us just to have the bare necessities. He wanted us to have the smell of flowers, the beauty of sunsets, the taste of strawberries, the wonders of whale watching, the feeling of sand between the toes and all the other marvels that the natural world has to offer. Not because we need it – because we don’t – but because he wanted to bless us. He wanted us to have this gift. When we destroy our environment, when we cause the animals and plants that he created to become extinct, to some extent we are throwing God’s gift back in his face.
Once while walking, my son asked me how I could tell that God was real. I pointed to a tree and said that tells me. It helps us breathe. It provides a home for the birds. It provides food for the animals. It has a complex structure that allows it to do all this, stay alive and reproduce. It does so much and is still so beautiful. Whenever I see a tree, I see God.
I see God in so many different ways in nature. I see echoes of his voice in the singing of birds. I see his reflection in the clouds. I catch a whiff of his aroma in the first flowers of Spring.
I don’t see him in shopping malls or polluted rivers or littered parks or destroyed bushland. And that’s my final reason for wanting to protect the environment. I want to be able to see God. Maybe not the real face-to-face encounter with God, but the shadow of him that he’s given us with the gift of this remarkable planet. And generations from now, I want my descendants to be able to see that God too.
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Great post, good food for thought.
Comment by S.L. Bradish
Mankind has survived through ice ages and droughts all the way back through time because God created us and the world we live in and keeps watch over us and it. Taking care of our world is a good thing, falling for this new-age "religion" that man has the ultimate power to change the climate isn't.
I like your writing, style and content. There's another new Orbler that you might want to check out.
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